Stress and Gastroesophageal Reflux Disease: Are They Related?

Muhammad Sajeel Turab; Mustafa Asghar Awan; Linta Masroor; Khadija Amir; Mahnoor Khan; Afrose Liaquat

doi:10.7759/cureus.79037

Stress and Gastroesophageal Reflux Disease: Are They Related?

Cureus. 2025 Feb 15;17(2):e79037. doi: 10.7759/cureus.79037. eCollection 2025 Feb.

Authors

Muhammad Sajeel Turab¹, Mustafa Asghar Awan¹, Linta Masroor¹, Khadija Amir¹, Mahnoor Khan¹, Afrose Liaquat²

Affiliations

¹ College of Medicine, Shifa Tameer-E-Millat University Shifa College of Medicine, Islamabad, PAK.
² Biochemistry, Shifa Tameer-E-Millat University Shifa College of Medicine, Islamabad, PAK.

Abstract

Background: Gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD) is a common complaint seen in medical clinics today, affecting countless people worldwide. Patients can present with a wide array of symptoms, ranging from classical complaints like heartburn and acid reflux to atypical cases like silent GERD. Recent advancements in diagnostic testing and imaging have aided in diagnosing and understanding GERD. Given the prevalence of GERD and stress within the confines of our society, it is pertinent to establish a correlation between these two, which this study aimed to investigate.

Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted using the Gastroesophageal Reflux Disease Questionnaire (GERDQ), the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS), and the Student Stress Inventory (SSI), combined in a survey distributed to participants online. These included students from various healthcare institutes.

Results: A total of 439 responses were analyzed, of which 262 (59.7%) were female and 177 (40.3%) were male. Of them, 319 (72.7%) were day scholars, and 120 (27.3%) were students living in hostel accommodation. The mean age was 20.5 years. Female participants had a significantly higher prevalence of GERD (16.4%, n = 43) than male participants (9.6%, n = 17) (p < 0.05). Similar trends were seen in both stress scales, with the female group showing a significantly higher proportion of high-stress individuals (p < 0.05). Program of study, age, accommodation, year of study, hours of sleep, and hours of study had no significant impact on the presence of GERD. However, when the same variables were analyzed against levels of stress, the mean hours of study and mean hours of sleep were significant in the SSI (p < 0.05). The high-stress group in the SSI had a significantly higher mean sleep duration (7.93 hours) and mean study duration (5.77 hours) than both the moderate-stress and low-stress groups.

Conclusion: Results of this study show that increased stress has a positive correlation with the prevalence of symptoms of GERD. Steps should be taken to reduce stress among medical students to alleviate such symptoms.

Keywords: gastroesophageal reflux disease (gerd); heartburn; lifestyles diseases; medical school; medical students; psychological stress; regurgitation; stress scales; youth.